Following the city of Yuma, Arizona declaring a state of emergency due to the immense amount of immigrants flooding into their city, Vice President Mike Pence is calling on Congress to start taking action immediately in addressing the “real crisis” at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The border law enforcement has recently been forced to release immigrants into U.S. cities due to the overflow of detention facilities, with Yuma being one of those cities that felt the weight and is now experiencing their shelters being at capacity, as IJR Red reported.

Yuma Mayor Douglas Nicholls declared the state of emergency on Tuesday and hopes it’ll stir a solution on immigration which “rests at the federal level.”

The mayor said that by declaring the state of emergency, he is “making sure that, not just locally, but throughout the country, it is clear that we are in a position that needs to be rectified on a national level, not just within the resources of our Yuma community.”

In a Fox News op-ed published Friday, the vice president put his foot down that “this crisis is unlike anything we’ve ever seen before.”

Pence visited Nogales, Arizona last Thursday where he said he witnessed “firsthand the humanitarian and national security emergency” at the U.S. border.

It was an honor to meet the extraordinary men and women of @CBP in Nogales this afternoon. @POTUS and I are grateful for the work that you do every day. Thank you for your service! pic.twitter.com/ynyLPpdTwo

— Vice President Mike Pence (@VP) April 12, 2019

“As those brave officers told me, we have a real crisis on our hands, and what’s driving it is the loopholes in our immigration laws that Congress has refused to close,” Pence said.

He laid out facts related to the immigration crisis:

“Nearly 3,000 aliens are stopped trying to cross our southern border each day. In the last six months alone, Customs and Border Protection has apprehended more than 360,000 aliens – close to the total number apprehended in all of fiscal year 2018. […] we’ve seen a 370 percent increase in the number of family units apprehended at the border this fiscal year to date.”

“But this humanitarian crisis is also endangering our national security,” Pence said, adding that the influx of immigrants trying to cross onto U.S. soil has caused Border Patrol to leave parts of the border “exposed.”

“This crisis is threatening lives on both sides of the border – and to end it, Congress must act to close the loopholes that drug cartels and human traffickers use to entice vulnerable families to make the long and dangerous journey north to our southern border.”

At @CBP station in Nogales, AZ, @VP adamant "we have a crisis on our southern border." Says he was told 4,300 were apprehended last Tuesday trying to cross into the US illegally. Told @CBP personnel that Administration determined to get it the resources it needs. pic.twitter.com/zhMqmeOJSe

— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) April 11, 2019

What’s the solution?

The vice president said the federal asylum laws need to be changed because they’re being taken advantage of by immigrants “presenting themselves to law enforcement and claiming a ‘credible fear’ of persecution without evidence of a credible threat.”

He noted a 2,000 percent increase in the 2018 fiscal year, compared to a decade prior, of Central American immigrants claiming credible fear, with a scale of less than one in ten of those migrants receiving asylum.

Additionally, Pence pointed to the Flores settlement agreement which “encourages adults to cross the border with a child in the hope of entering and staying in the United States.”

“Democrats in Congress need to sit down and take a break from everything else they’re focused on and deal with what the American people want them to deal with, which is securing our border and protecting our country.”

— Vice President Mike Pence (@VP) April 12, 2019

“President Trump is doing his job. The men and women of law enforcement are doing their jobs,” Pence concluded. “Now it’s time for Congress to do its job and close the loopholes in our immigration laws that are driving the humanitarian and security crisis on our southern border.”